The Explorer Room

 My sister and I put up the decals for the new preschool classroom today. It was a bit more challenging then I had anticipated; not the decals, they went up pretty well. But the room was in still in transition and it had both the new furniture for the classroom and the old furniture from the psychologist's office so it was a bit of a challenge even getting to the walls.

I love the new room sign ... my sister is so talented!

The room is going to be perfect and I like how it fits in so well with the other rooms too. Oh, to be able to be a kid again ... doesn't it just make you want to go in and play?

You can find the sources for the decals and the wall color in my previous post here. While I was there, I measured and took some before photos for a new project ...

I love to see that this successful doctor is growing and expanding her business. This space will be the new offices for the psychologists (as the classrooms are taking over the old space) and a meeting room for parents. We are limited as to what we can do (no painting allowed) so art will be a crucial element. 

Etsy

I am actually "okay" with the white walls ... you know I wanted to paint my walls all white and it didn't work out so I can get out my white wall desire here! 

Etsy

The goal is to make it a space that will feel welcoming to the parents. And inspirational. 

Etsy

Etsy

I hope you have an extraordinary day! xo

Exploring a new preschool classroom idea

Do you remember the Pediatric Clinic for autistic children I designed? 

They are expanding and need another pre-school classroom. They currently have three classrooms and each has a different theme.

When we were selecting the themes, I learned I needed to be careful with the wording.  For example, for the room where I wanted to use giraffe and elephant decals and thought it would be cute to call it, "The Jungle Room" but I was informed that no parent would want their child in a "jungle" room. So I re-worded it to be, "The Safari Room". 

My sister made the room signs with the decals as her inspiration. We also had a "Marine Room" and "Forest Room".

As I thought about what we could use for a theme for the new room I came up with dinosaurs, farm, airplanes ... and then saw this:

looksugar via Etsy

The new room will be, "The Explorer Room".

GoatGrinStudio via Etsy

Danadecals via Etsy

These preschool classrooms are for children with autism and I used wall decals so that there was nothing that could be removed, broken or damaged. We kept the rooms somewhat minimal but cute so they would be inviting but with little distraction. 

Benjamin Moore Blue Haze 1667

And because the rooms have two-way mirrors installed in them we had to make sure the paint color inside the rooms was lighter than the walls outside in the hallway. The new room will have the lightest shade of sky blue. 

The space as I first saw it

When I first started this project I was quite overwhelmed. I had done a few medical offices and one pediatric office but nothing close to the size and magnitude of this one. I remember asking the doctor a million questions about her needs and what the various rooms would require and she said, "don't worry ... just treat the rooms like a preschool classroom." I had to laugh because even that was a stretch for me.  

I also didn't know much about autism or the special requirements that would be needed to be taken into consideration in designing this space, but one thing that was really important to me was that the moms and dads would find this place as special as the children they brought. I think we achieved that. 

I'm excited to hear they are expanding!

Finishing up & more decal love

It is so great to be able to actually finish a project. Not that any project is ever entirely done ... because you know, a room is never really done - it is always tweaked, improved on, and added to. But today I can say that I am (at this moment) finished with one of the largest projects I have worked on.

Do you remember the clinic for the autistic kids? I wrote about it here and here. We used a lot of decals and they were so successful that the client wanted to add a few more. That is what I finished today. I cannot say enough about decals.

The dandelion is one of my favorites. We (my wonderful sister assistant and I) added this outside the restrooms - it was a leftover from another room.

All the decals were ordered through Etsy and can be custom made in any color you want. Most can be custom sized as well! They are easy to install - some are just a little more labor intensive than others. 

The decals are an easy and inexpensive way to add interest and color to a blank wall. This tree branch was only $39.00 (from here).

This therapy room needed a little punch to the walls but it couldn't be too overwhelming. The flowers did the trick. It was nice to be in the completed office today and see it thriving and filled with children. It was gratifying to see the rooms that we thoughtfully designed for these kids to be utilized and enjoyed the way we had hoped. And nice to be finished. 

Well ... there is that one spot near the entry that could use a little color ...

Preschool classrooms {part 2}

My favorite paint color in the pediatric clinic (see part one here) are on the walls in the conference room, kitchen and restroom. Because I like the color so much they are also my favorite rooms. The color is Atmospheric AF-500 by Benjamin Moore. It is a great color to use for a powder room, laundry room or even a bedroom (I have used it for all three).  

{Paint color: Atmospheric AF-500}

Since the public areas of the office needed to be painted in a more subdued color scheme, I wanted to introduce more color in the rooms that were used primarily by the staff. The color would have been too much for the other spaces but in these rooms the color adds a nice punch to break up all the neutrals and it brings a little more life to the office. I received some feedback from one of the psychologists today who said the conference room felt very calming. I like that.

The conference room:

There will be a flat screen TV mounted on the wall opposite the photograph wall. The photographs will eventually be the children from the clinic (they have placeholder children in them currently) and the frames are Ikea Ribba frames with custom mats inserted to hold an 8x10 photograph. Tip: If you are having custom mats made, make sure you have the inside measurement cut slightly smaller than the size of the photograph or artwork you want to display so that it doesn't fall through the opening.

I love the framed photographs. These frames were only $20 each ($19.99) so if you keep the mats that the frames come with (11 & 1/2" square openings) you can have quite a nice art wall for around $200. I hung my frames around 3" apart which made a total measurement of roughly 5 & 1/2 feet by 5 & 1/2 feet.  Frame a lovely calendar or pages from an art book and you have a unique and very inexpensive art wall.

The kitchen:

I love the way the kitchen turned out. We used all Ikea cabinetry and the backsplash is a linear glass and stone blend (Eclipse series) from Tilecrest.  I used the same door pulls (Ikea Vinna handles) throughout the office to add continuity and simplicity. I like that they are a substantial size and at $7.99 for a pack of two they fit in with the budget. 

floor detail

The kitchen has an eat-in dining table for the staff. The table is not extended correctly in the photos and obviously the room is not finished (I will be adding art on the walls) but you can get the idea. The table is the Bjursta table ($199) and the chairs are one of my favorites, the Snille ($22.99 with the swivel). I use these Snille chairs a lot for children's desk chairs because they come in great colors (love the hot pink) and kids love a swivel chair with wheels!

The restroom is still "in progress" as well but I wanted to show you that I used the same wall color here as in the kitchen and conference room. When I am selecting paint colors for a residence or for a commercial space, I like to keep my wall colors to a minimum. I start with a main wall color that will usually extend through the hallways and large open spaces and then I select individual room colors trying to repeat colors where I can. In this office I have also carried the blue to the more neutral spaces through decal colors, toy baskets and door signs which I will show in a future post.  

I purchased the vanity online from Modern Bathroom a local company here in the Los Angeles area. The Leto 36" vanity came with everything you see (the mirror, the faucet, the top and the pulls) and was nicely priced at $1,029.95 including delivery.  And it came in less than a week! 

We added a large Ikea cabinet that matches the other cabinetry in the office adjacent to the vanity for storage and I will be adding the decoration over the weekend. I am hoping to put all the finishing touches in the office by the beginning of next week and then I will post the final photos. 

Preschool classrooms {part 1}

Today was my second day hanging art and placing furniture in the pediatric clinic. It is moving slower than I had thought. There is a lot of furniture to put together and you know how Ikea stuff is - sometimes it goes together well and then sometimes there are missing parts and confusing directions. The guys are doing a great job but it is just taking a long time. The office is not finished so think of this more as a sneak preview!

Let me give you a little background. The client is a pediatric neurologist who specializes in the treatment of children with autism. This office will house three preschool classrooms, two speech pathologist offices and three psychology offices in addition to an office for the principal doctor who is my client. There are 15 rooms altogether. Three pre-school classrooms, 6 offices for the various doctors, a conference room, kitchen, restroom, manager's office and the waiting room and reception area. When we started, the space was a large empty box.

This is the doctor's first office and she asked for a modern space with a slight Asian feel. She really loved the artwork from Ashes and Snow and asked for some of that artwork to be placed in the office. The other criteria was that the office space be somewhat minimal (not a lot of things the children could get into) and not too much color and pattern in the classrooms to keep the children from being distracted. From the beginning I was very sensitive to the fact that this was a space for children but also for their parents and I wanted it to feel like breath of fresh air to the parents and a place where they would feel hope and be encouraged.

Ashes and Snow {via}

This was a large project for me and a challenge since I design primarily residential spaces so I decided to start with the classrooms (seemed the most fun!). My inspiration came from decals that I found on Esty. Initially the client had expressed a desire for three rooms to have a marine theme. While I was searching for ideas with an ocean / marine theme, I found so many other cute ideas that were not ocean related that it just evolved from there. We settled on a marine room, a safari room and a forest room. Because the rooms were small, the budget limited and we needed the stimulus to be fairly minimal, I used decals primarily for the artwork in the classrooms. And while each classroom is painted a different color, I used the color teal in each room to tie them all together.

The marine room:

My sister helped me with the artwork for the door signs. We used the decals from each room as our inspiration.

I oredered custom rugs from FLOR, and am still waiting for the rest of the furniture to be put together but it is a good start.

The Safari Room:

This is my favorite room. In fact, the giraffe decal was what got me hooked on the idea of using decals in the first place and also convinced me that we needed to branch out from the all marine themed rooms.

Each classroom is equipped with a 2-way mirror and audio for parents to view the teachers working with their children. 

The Forest Room:

When I was searching for decals I was impressed by the variety that was available. I was touched by some of the quotes and wanted to add some encouragement for the parents.

But my favorite decals were the large birch tree trunks that I put in the waiting room. They turned out phenomenal. 

Come back tomorrow and I will share what I did in the conference room, kitchen and restroom.